Cruel Winter Read online

  THE THING IN THE TUNNEL

  “Listen,” Paul said.

  Slow footsteps echoed, a soft crunch in the dark. At first Jack thought Ronnie turned the flashlight off and snuck into the tunnel in order to scare them, but the footsteps were too heavy. They belonged to someone bigger.

  “Reach out your hand, Paul.”

  “Okay.”

  They started to go but something found Paul first.

  It jerked Paul back, and purely out of reflex, Jack clamped on to Paul’s hand, this alone preventing him from being torn back into the tunnel by whatever was down there.

  “It’s got me hooked! Its arm is around me!”

  Jack felt Paul leave his feet as his attacker hoisted him into the air, intent on dragging Paul back into the tunnel.

  It pulled again, like a shark dragging a swimmer down, and it was too strong. Paul’s hand slipped from Jack’s, and Paul shrieked.

  “Let me go! Bastard! Let me go! God, it smells bad!”

  Jack charged ahead and slammed into someone as solid as a muscle man in a magazine. He wrapped his arms around the waist and pulled, but it was like trying to drag down a redwood tree. He was being dragged behind the guy like tin cans on a weddng car. It stank like old leaves or hair that’s clogged in a drain, wet and dead.

  What is it and why did we have to run into it?

  CRUEL WINTER

  ANTHONY IZZO

  PINNACLE BOOKS

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  THE THING IN THE TUNNEL

  Title Page

  Dedication

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Copyright Page

  To Jenn, for your constant love and support. I couldn’t have

  come this far without you.

  CHAPTER 1

  As Jack Harding walked down Main Street in Brampton, a snowblower hummed in the distance and an orange snowplow cruised past, spraying slush against the curb. The snow hills piled at the curbs stood as high as elephants and the flurries blew in sideways. But the snow didn’t bother him. Not now. Christmas break was a week away. He was with Chris and Paul, the three of them ready to bash out a game of king of the mountain. Life couldn’t be better.

  “Hey, check it out,” Chris said. He tapped Jack on the shoulder and pointed across the street. A kid in a red jacket and blue snow pants charged down Main Street. His head was lowered and he skidded every few feet.

  “Who lit his ass on fire?” Jack said.

  “Looks like he’s on the run from someone,” Chris said.

  The kid looked up, waved to them. They kept walking and rounded the corner of the police station. In the lot, three snow mounds as high as the second-floor windows stood beyond the police cruisers. God bless the plow drivers.

  “King of the mountain, baby!” Chris charged up the hill and stood at the top with hands on hips, his blond hair poking out from underneath the front of his cap. “Check out these hills.”

  “They must be ten feet high,” Paul said.

  “Which one of you is going to try and knock me off?” Chris said.

  “You’re a dead man,” Jack said, plowing up the hill. Paul followed him.

  Life stayed good, or at least normal, until fifteen minutes into the game, footsteps trod up the hill, the snow going crunch-crunch underneath. Jack heard them, turned his head, and saw someone reach the top, slip, and roll down the other side.

  The kid stopped at the bottom and rolled onto his back and lay in a crucifixion pose. He had a moon-shaped face, pink cheeks, and narrow eyes, blue as the winter sky. He might have taken a men’s small in that jacket, and his jeans seemed to bulge at the seams. Jack took him for about a hundred and fifty pounds, a baby moose.

  “You guys gotta help me,” he said, breathing hard.

  They stood staring at the chubby kid. Chris with his arms folded as if he owned the whole hill and Paul wringing his hands and already looking over his shoulder for an escape route.

  The new kid stood up. Jack climbed to the bottom of the hill, and his friends followed.

  “Hi. I’m Ronnie Winter,” he said, extending a gloved hand toward Jack.

  Jack looked at Chris, then shrugged. Why not? Kids his age usually didn’t shake hands upon meeting, but he didn’t suppose it would hurt anything. “Jack Harding.” Jack shook the gloved hand.

  Ronnie approached Chris with an outstretched hand, but Chris kept his arms folded. This didn’t seem to faze Ronnie and he walked right up to Paul and thrust his hand out. Paul looked at the hand as if it might grow teeth and bite him. He shook it quickly and jerked his hand back.

  Ronnie’s breath plumed out like exhaust from a tailpipe. “You guys have got to help me.” He sucked in another deep breath. “They chased me all the way down Main.”

  “Who did?” Jack asked.

  “Some greasy-looking kid with a big nose.”

  Jack’s stomach fluttered, for he knew right away who had chased Ronnie down Main Street. None other than Vinnie Palermo. An invasion of flesh-eating aliens would be preferable to having Vinnie show up.

  “Oh, shit. Vinnie?” Paul did a nervous little dance in the snow, as if he couldn’t decide which way to run first. “I have to go.”

  Jack didn’t blame Paul for being jittery, and if Vinnie had busted Jack’s nose at one time, he might want to run, too.

  “Relax, Fussel. He won’t do anything while I’m here,” Chris said.

  “That’s easy for you to say, too-tall,” Paul said.

  “Yeah, you could bench-press him if you wanted to,” Jack said.

  “Twenty-four-inch pythons,” Chris said, flexing his biceps.

  “I got your twenty-four inches right here,” Jack said.

  “So will you guys help me?” Ronnie said.

  Before Jack could answer, Vinnie Palermo stormed over the top of the bank.

  Vinnie stood at the crest of the hill, wearing a jean jacket with a black T-shirt underneath, despite the twenty-degree temperature. His slicked-back hair exposed a pimple-ridden forehead, and one bushy black eyebrow loomed over his eyes like a storm cloud. Vinnie kicked the toe of his black work boots into the snow and started down the hill.

  Jack noticed Vinnie didn’t take his eyes off Chris the whole time, and with good reason, because Chris might pound him into the snow like a railroad stake if given the chance.

  “Come here, you fat faggot,” Vinnie said.

  As many times as Jack had seen Vinnie, he never got over the frea
kish nose that occupied a good portion of Vinnie’s face. It was hooked, with a small lump in the bridge, and looked as if some practical joker of a sculptor slapped a triangular piece of flesh in the center of his face. The nostrils were large and little nose hairs jutted from them. The kids all called him “the beak” or “the schnoz,” but never when he was in earshot. Doing so might result in early death.

  Vinnie stepped toward Ronnie, who backpedaled.

  “Come here.” Vinnie beckoned him with a finger. “I’m not going to tell you again.”

  “What’s your beef with him?” Chris asked.

  “Stay out of this,” Vinnie said.

  Vinnie advanced on Ronnie, and Joe Leary climbed over the hill. He was stocky and dark-haired, with a face full of brown freckles. Leary wore a dirty leather jacket and black jeans, now caked with salt around the ankles. They had to deal with Vinnie and one of his flunkies. Not good.

  “There’s fat boy,” Leary said.

  “Just what did he do to you?” Jack said.

  “Threw a snowball at me,” Vinnie said.

  “You started it,” Ronnie said.

  “I don’t like getting hit with snowballs.”

  “Didn’t hit you,” Ronnie muttered.

  “Did too. And if I said you did, you did.”

  Vinnie’s coat was dry as dust, which led Jack to believe Ronnie’s snowball had missed its target.

  He took another step toward Ronnie. Paul flinched as Vinnie approached, and the shark smelled blood. With a wicked grin on his face, he shoved Paul, and Paul tumbled backward, landing on his ass and scrambling backward like a crab. Leary laughed, a dirty heh-heh-heh.

  “You’re coming with me, fat ass.” Vinnie clenched his teeth as if he might bite Ronnie’s nose off. It wasn’t out of the question.

  “Take a walk before I decide to beat on you,” Chris said.

  “Bite me, Francis.”

  Vinnie lunged for Ronnie, but Chris intercepted and grabbed him by the jacket and spun him around. Vinnie swung at Chris, but Chris threw his arm up and blocked the punch.

  Jack spotted Leary chugging down the hill to help out Vinnie. No way Chris could handle both of them, so Jack decided to help, even if it cost him later.

  Vinnie rose to his feet, and Jack snuck up behind him, hooked his foot around Vinnie’s ankle, and shoved. Vinnie sprawled and landed face-first in the snow.

  God, that felt good, Jack thought.

  Chris turned toward Leary, who lowered his head and slammed into him. Grabbing Leary’s coat by the shoulders, he turned and flung him aside. Now Vinnie was on his feet, a thin line of snow coating his eyebrows and the front of his hair. He looked like an evil snowman coming to get revenge on someone for stealing his top hat.

  “You’re dead, Harding,” he said, pointing at Jack. He reached into his jacket pocket, flicked his wrist, and pulled out a gold butterfly knife.

  Paul muttered, “Oh no.”

  What would it feel like to get stabbed? Would the blade feel hot or cold as it pierced him?

  Ronnie stood with his mouth open, as if surprised one snowball caused all this commotion. It was his fault, damn it. Even if you were new to town, you didn’t go around throwing snowballs at people like Vinnie Palermo.

  Vinnie started forward, the blade looking as big as a cutlass. Even Chris looked worried.

  “I’m gonna cut you in half, Harding.”

  “No, you won’t.”

  The voice came from the top of the snowbank. It was Officer Stavros, his thick black mustache coated with snow. A blue knit cap was jammed on his head, and he carried a blue duffel bag with the word Police written on the side. He was either leaving or coming to work.

  “What’s this all about?”

  “We were playing king of the mountain when these two idiots showed up,” Jack said.

  “That fat fuck threw a snowball at me,” Vinnie said, then added, “Officer.”

  “Watch your mouth, Palermo. And give me the knife,” Stavros said.

  “Why don’t you come and get it?”

  “Maybe I should throw your butt in one of our cells.”

  “Fine,” he said, giving Stavros a look that said: I would like to see you eat a shit sandwich.

  Vinnie lunged at Jack, feigning attack. Jack flinched, expecting Vinnie to drive the knife into his belly.

  “This isn’t over.” Vinnie pointed at Jack. “Not by a mile.”

  Officer Stavros took the knife from Vinnie, folded it, and slid it into his coat pocket. “I want all of you to go home. Palermo, you and your friend leave first. And don’t get any ideas about an ambush. I’ll be watching you,” he said.

  Vinnie and Joe Leary trudged over the snowbank and disappeared into the swirling flurries.

  “Stay away from those two. I really think he would have stabbed you,” Stavros said.

  “Me too,” Jack agreed.

  They walked out of the lot, Jack expecting Vinnie and Joe Leary to be waiting for them, but they were gone. The snow whipped around them and Jack had hoped for at least one day home from school, but the superintendent was a stubborn son of a bitch and kept it open. He didn’t have to walk in it.

  The four boys turned right onto Main Street, Chris and Jack in front, Ronnie and Paul behind them.

  “You guys saved me back there,” Ronnie said.

  “You almost got us killed,” Chris said.

  “Sorry,” Ronnie said, hanging his head.

  “I think Chris is exaggerating,” Jack said.

  “Just what is Vinnie’s problem, anyway?” Ronnie said.

  “Terminal case of asshole fever,” Jack said, and the others laughed.

  “He’s a Neanderthal,” Paul said.

  “What the hell is that, Fussel?” Chris asked.

  “It’s a caveman,” Paul said.

  “Who told you that?”

  “I read it in National Geographic.” Paul rolled his eyes. “You might know that if you ever read a book.”

  “I read,” Chris said.

  “Sports Illustrated,” Paul said.

  “Knock it off, you guys,” Jack said. “So, Ronnie, what happened with you and Vinnie?”

  “Him and that other kid were coming down the street. When they passed by me, Vinnie called me a fat pig. So I made up a little snow missile and fired it at him.”

  “Did you score a hit?” Paul asked.

  “Naw. It went over his head and plopped on the sidewalk. But it pissed him off pretty good.”

  “You got balls, kid. I’ll give you that,” Chris said.

  Jack wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or if it meant Ronnie was really stupid.

  “You think so?” Ronnie said. He had a big grin on his face, as if Chris had bestowed on him the ultimate compliment.

  “Yeah. Vinnie doesn’t screw around,” Chris said. “A couple years ago he slashed Frankie Coldgrass across the arm with a razor blade. Kid had ten stitches.”

  “Wow,” Ronnie said.

  “I’d stay away from him,” Paul said. “Broke my nose two years ago.”

  “You’d stay away from a kitty cat, you pansy,” Chris said.

  Jack burst into laughter at Chris’s use of the words “kitty cat,” and was still laughing thirty seconds later when they reached Argon Street.

  “What’s so funny?” Paul said.

  “Nothing,” he said. Sometimes certain phrases just got to you and ignited a big old belly laugh. It was usually during a test or in church, where you would get into the most trouble, and it was always uncontrollable.

  “Well, boys, this is my stop,” Chris said. “You’d better watch your back, kid. Vinnie doesn’t forget easy.” Chris turned down Argon Street, giving them a wave, and the three boys continued down Main. The wind gusted and Jack tucked his chin to his chest for protection.

  “How long have you been here, Ronnie?” Paul asked.

  “We moved onto the Steadman place a week ago.”

  Jack stopped. The kid was full of crap. The Stead
man property was over eight hundred acres and had a selling price of three million dollars. There was a thirty-thousand-square-foot mansion, houses for groundskeepers, stables, and barns. Harold Steadman III had died of a heart attack five years ago and the property sat vacant. Nobody wanted it because of its history, and the state of New York was ready to snatch it up and make it a park. Apparently they found a buyer.

  “You live in the Steadman place?” Jack said.

  “Yep.”

  “And I’m the king of France,” Paul said.

  “Then we’ll go there and I’ll prove it to you guys.”

  Jack would give his left nut to see even the grounds of the estate, and to see the mansion he might cheerfully give them both up. “Let’s go then.”

  “Not me. My dad will kill me if I’m late for dinner,” Paul said.

  “Later, Paul.”

  “Later.”

  Paul ran across Main, dodging a Metro bus, whose driver blasted the horn at him.

  The wind rippled Jack’s scarf like a piece of ribbon.

  “Let’s get out of this cold and see this house of yours.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Emma Greer’s head throbbed and her throat felt raw. Cold sweat enveloped her body, and no matter how tightly she wrapped herself in a comforter, the fever made her shiver.

  Strep throat was a pisser, as Mom might say. The last week of school before Christmas break was starting tomorrow, and she was going to miss it. The teachers served punch and cookies and let the last few days of class slip by with no homework assignments. And Emma was missing it because of lousy strep throat. She thought Christmas was a little silly, keeping a tree in your living room, but the parties were fun.

  Her mother entered the bedroom carrying a tray with a navy blue bowl and a matching coffee cup on it. Myra Greer had the same rich olive skin as her daughter, and her black hair showed strands of gray at the temples. The first signs of crow’s-feet appeared around her eyes, and she had a few more wrinkles around the mouth every year. They weren’t from smiling.

  “Hello, dear.” She set the tray on Emma’s lap. “Brought you some tomato soup and tea.”

  “Thanks.”

  She placed the back of her hand on Emma’s cheek.

  “You’re still warm,” she said, caressing Emma’s hair.